Inside the Lines
by detective-sweetheart
Summary: The key to everything was to stay inside the lines. But it wasn't always possible.


**A/N: Written for a challenge going around on LJ...as is my habit, this fic holds hints of "On Fire" and "The Good" if you look hard enough. Don't own CI and that's about it for now. **

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The key was to stay inside the lines.

It was a lesson that Jimmy had learned over the years of subjecting himself to coloring books and crayons across the kitchen table, the result of efforts to keep his daughters occupied. Staying inside the lines meant that the picture would turn out the way it was supposed to, without the stray marks of an unsure hand moving across the paper. The lines were easy enough to see, bold and black and impossible to miss. But every now and then, one of them would slip.

The pictures got torn out and stuck up on the fridge anyway, by magnets that had been collected over those same years. Some of them were colored in perfectly, no marks outside the lines and something that resembled a signature at the bottom; others had the same kind of signatures and a few mistakes, but that was all right, too. Nothing in the world was flawless, and this was hardly an exception. Either way, the colors faded together to create something whole, and that was just the way it worked.

What struck him as funny about this was that it wasn't always easy to stay inside the lines.

Most of the pictures had those stray marks across them, the result of jostled elbows while in the midst of coloring, or simply not paying attention. It never seemed to take away from the whole picture at first glance, but days later, he'd look at them and be drawn more to those outside marks than to the picture itself. They were usually in some different color than the rest of the picture, test marks to make sure that this was the right color. If it wasn't, then it was usually discarded and another crayon was fished out of the box. Blue, red, green, orange, yellow…it didn't matter. The white parts of the coloring book pages were for testing the proverbial waters, and if the first color drawn failed, then the tests would continue until the right one was found.

There is an old box upstairs filled with these old coloring book pages, because Jimmy couldn't really bear the thought of throwing them away, and as it turns out, Angie couldn't, either. Years after the last pictures were finally taken down to be replaced by report cards and schoolwork and other art projects done under the supervision of teachers rather than parents, he comes across this box in the attic. It is unmarked, so he opens it, not knowing what to find, but the contents are not at all surprising. There in front of him is a look at the past via cartoon characters and connect-the-dots games; color-by-number sheets and blank pages filled with the scribbles of little girls who have long since grown up.

The stray marks are still there, too.

It's more for this reason than any other that he sits, abandoning the task of clearing out the attic, so that he can look through them again.

The drawings follow years that he's long since lost count of. At first, most of the coloring was done outside the lines, the concept of staying _in_ the lines having not yet been grasped. As time went by, the marks became few and far between, more by accident than on purpose, but they were still there. It almost reflected life, Jimmy thinks, wryly. One could stay in the lines for the entire time, and yet something could always come along to push them out.

The same thing held true in the department.

There, the lines were clearly defined, and no one ever crossed them…at least, as far as everyone else knew. The Internal Affairs Bureau found themselves outside the lines, outcasts only because of the jobs they'd been assigned. The Special Victims Units kept to themselves, but would occasionally reach out to work with other squads. Homicide was in a league of their own, but not immune from the effects of decisions coming from higher up on the lines.

As for the Major Case Squad, well…they were all over the place. Inside the lines, then out, but somehow, the most important lines had never been crossed.

Not until now, anyway.

Department lines were blue, completely opposite of those inside the coloring books. There, it was all right to go outside the lines, because there was no permanent damage done. Out on the streets, if you went outside the lines, it meant three things: either IAB came around or you got hauled in front of the brass. Or both.

Stray marks always mattered the most when that happened. The records were pulled out and examined, colleagues were interviewed…They said it was in the interests of justice, and that justice was blind, but if it was blind, how could it see those marks? How could it see those stray bits of color marking up an otherwise clean slate?

Jimmy finds himself thinking at this point that every now and then, it gets to the point where there are too many marks to be ignored; too many bits of red and orange and yellow among the blue…warning signs that can't be overlooked. He'd _like_ to think that this isn't the case here, but the odds are against him this time. And there's no going back inside the lines once you've been pushed out…even if you haven't done anything wrong.

Here and now, in this moment, the marks are red, and there are too many of them to ignore.

Sure, he could tell his detectives to find out what happened, but he doesn't want to know. The color of betrayal is something that hasn't ever fit into any lines at all, and now it settles over him, black and white and gray. They are the colors of uncertainty, of something indescribable that doesn't fit into one category or another. He used to think that he'd be able to make it to the point where he was retiring of his own accord rather than someone else's, but those days, like the days of the coloring books, are long gone, and they're not coming back.

The coloring book pages start to turn more into blank pages, the signs of progression; drawings that have no boundaries, because the limits of imagination do not exist. He continues flipping through them, almost amused by the stray marks made and erased.

There is no room for second chances anymore. There is no going back and erasing what happened, either, because that was a mark made in permanent ink…one that will be there forever. Everyone started out with a blank slate, Jimmy thinks now, pulling even more drawings out of the box. We all started out in the same place, we all ended up where we want to be, and now it's all coming apart at the seams.

Once again, he's hit by the thought of the colors of betrayal: black and white and gray. It used to be so easy, he muses. It used to be so much less complicated than it was now. Once upon a time, things had been black and white between the lot of them, all of those who had gone through the academy together. Now it is only a matter of time before they all start taking sides.

The lines are still there, though, blue and gold and black and white and everything in between.

He starts putting the pictures back in the box at this point, but before he can, his gaze falls on one that has slipped out of the pile he's holding. He puts those ones back into the box, puts the lid back on, and reaches down for this stray one.

What he sees surprises him.

It is a picture of him, drawn by the youngest of his girls. Stapled to it is a photograph of him in dress uniform, taken while he wasn't paying attention. But it isn't this that catches his attention now as much as it is the way it has been drawn.

There are stray marks here, too, just like in real life, because nothing is flawless, least of all him.

It is this picture that he takes with him when he goes back downstairs.

The key is to stay inside the lines.

But it isn't always possible.


End file.
